Monday, December 12, 2005

The Search for Kevin Van Winkle

KVW was the handle of a legendary poster over on the AAPL board at Investor's Hub. The guy used to trade more shares of stocks during his lunch break than I ever thought about owning in my lifetime. Here's an almost typical post just to give you an idea of the kind of volume he was dealing in:

"What a mistake! I sold my 65K shares of AAPL two days ago and moved the money into another stock. I got $24 for my shares. Today, I could get $25 so I lost an opportunity at increasing my account by $65K. Worse yet, the stock I changed into is down a dollar (I have 50K shares of it) so I'm down $50K on that trade.

"So, in two days I've managed to mess up to the tune of over $100K...

"Why did I do it? I was fed up that AAPL didn't move more on the Merrill Lynch report. I was also fed up at all the political rants on this board by the left. It left me wanting to get out of all my AAPL and that is what I did.

"Anyway, congratulations to those who are long and strong AAPL. The theory that iPod has transformed Apple and that the stock should be trading much higher is just starting to play out. I hope things pull back a bit so I can get in again, but this may be the breakout.

"Too bad I wasn't patient just two more days..."

That post was dated March 4, 2004. Obviously not one of KVW's better days. (AAPL closed today above $75 a share.)

Then one day -- well, 4/30/2004 to be exact -- KVW stopped posting altogether. Given his posting history, however, speculation continues to this day as to his status and whereabouts. Did he ultimately strike it rich in AAPL and retire to some tropical isle? Or did he lose everything in SUNW and SGI?